MT EREBUS YET AGAIN.

New Zealand has failed to learn from disasters such as Cave Creek and Mt Erebus in preventing tragedies, the Pike River inquiry has heard.

The accusation came on the eve of today's first anniversary of the deaths of 29 men after the fatal explosion at the underground West Coast coalmine.

"Sadly, but of crucial relevance for future safety, Pike River proves that we have failed to learn from previous accidents," Auckland University's human factors group director, Dr Kathleen Callaghan, told the inquiry yesterday.

THIS WOMAN KNOWS ALL ABOUT AIRCRAFT? SHE TOOK OVER 25 HOURS TO GO SOLO IN A TOMAHAWK, AND HAS THE AUDACITY TO SAY AIR NEW ZEALAND LEARNT NOTHING FROM LOOSING ZK-NZP AT MT EREBUS. HOW DO THESE PEOPLE GET HEARD ON THE PUBLIC PURSE.

Maybe she was being instructed by a low-hours PPL who was 'hour-building'?

But seriously, point taken....what the heck is the connection with Erebus and Pike River? It is certainly true that almost all accidents (and incidents) are the result of a chain of issues or failures but why bring Erebus into it? Consider a motorway smash....everyone traveling closer than thinking distance (the norm) at speed, a driver overtired gets fazed when hitting a patch of bad viz and loses it. Massive smash-up like you get on the Po valley regularly. Cause: Dopey driver, tailgating, bad viz. It's a combination and sequence.

Absolutely nothing, but callaghan made a reference to mt erebus as an expert witness. She was once the pmo of nzcaa and successfully grounded nearly every pilot over 60 by applying a heart foundation table to the older pilot group. I understand that she once had ambitions of getting into nasa! Her flight instructor was a B cat on a CPL (NZ Ratings) and was a very experienced instructor.

For what it is worth, the enquiry into the Pike Rive mine disaster is revealing an apparently serious set of failures in the systems for ensuring mine safety. Her claim would be that Mt Erebus revealed similar system failure. The link would be that both events caused major loss of life in New Zealand arguably as a result of deficiencies in safety management. I don't know how valid her claim is: NZ has changed a lot between the two events, and any failures in the Erebus case were likely caused by amateurish mateship the sense everyone knows everyone and we're all good blokes and don't need to be bureaucratic. The mine explosion, if the allegations prove to be true, was caused by single-minded following of market forces, self- or de-regulation, and a distrust of civil servants. Similar, actually, but with different ideologies.

Believe it or not, but pilots are human. Just as mine workers are. Their errors are the same. Even if you've flown solo after just 15 mn of dual flight, you're just a human (and you should be warned about the dangers of overconfidence).

So it makes sense to study human errors globally, and not just to stick to aviation. You learn from others' errors.

Interestingly two of the key people running the Pike River Mine were previosuly very senior inspectors within the Queensland Department of Mines and as such perhaps should have been a little more aware of the risks and diligent in their provision of advice regarding the safe operarion of this mine.

However I fail to see how "lessons learned" re Mt Erebus can be related to the Pike River disaster

"Your point? That it's better for people to have fewer hours before being left in sole charge of an aircraft? "

The point would appear to be that there is no evidence of any natural talent in piloting a small aircraft. Of that points relevance to any enquiry is a bit harder to understand.

It is however easy to connect the lack of oversight by the regulatory bodies who were supposed to oversee that the required regulations are being complied with were as absent in Pike River as they were in the Mt Erebus disaster.

Erebus has been in the public eye in NZ again recently, following the release of a book by that merdia aviation 'expert' ( see below ) Paul Holmes, a one time NZ TV news presenter, and Stearman pilot who had to land said Stearman once - to enquire exactly where he was !

I haven't,and won't, read the book, but those who have reckons he champions the crew and rubbishes the opinions of the Chief Inspector of Accidents and the Judge presiding over the Court of Enquiry. Not having read it I can't comment on the opinion of others of course.

As a result, it has been suggested to me that the widow of the, then, aforementioned Chief Inspector of Accidents might well have a case for libel against P.H.

Not for me to judge whether he is right or wrong, but dredging it all up again for personal publishing profit is a bit tasteless in my opinon, a publication entitled The Erebus Papers (which I have read ) contains everything that was published at the time, make your own mind up.

I've read PH's book & as a pure read I found it mostly quite good. The content of course will always be contentious, as there were so many parties involved, Flight Crew, Air Accident Investigation Branch, Air New Zealand etc. I did think at the time of the tragedy though, that it would have been advisable, eventhough the Flight Deck Crew had been given a verbal briefing, as this was the Pilots first Antarctic flight, they should have had a Training Captain with them on the day. I operated the DC10 for six years, lovely aircraft & it took me to some great destinations along the way Long time ago for Erebus though & I appreciate their are many views held by many people on this accident. God Bless all those on board that day, their families, colleagues & friends. Best to let rest I think.

"Sadly, but of crucial relevance for future safety, Pike River proves that we have failed to learn from previous accidents," Auckland University's human factors group director, Dr Kathleen Callaghan, told the inquiry yesterday.

THIS WOMAN KNOWS ALL ABOUT AIRCRAFT? SHE TOOK OVER 25 HOURS TO GO SOLO IN A TOMAHAWK, AND HAS THE AUDACITY TO SAY AIR NEW ZEALAND LEARNT NOTHING FROM LOOSING ZK-NZP AT MT EREBUS. HOW DO THESE PEOPLE GET HEARD ON THE PUBLIC PURSE.

I would suggest you are viewing her statement from entirely the wrong perspective.

She is not commenting specifically about aviation nor is she commenting specifically about mining. I would guess she mentioned Cave Creek and Erebus because these are two classic examples of systematic failure (ergo the reason model) all kiwi's know about.

I recently had a lengthy discussion with a chap about safety in the power industry. Turn's out they rely heavily on the reason model too (no real surprise). I knew nothing about the power industry, he knew nothing about aviation but the model transcends the industries and we had an interesting discussion.

Dr Callaghan's evidence to the Pike River enquiry (Commission Hearings - pikeriver.royalcommission.govt.nz) concerned basic Human Factors matters and their influence on events. The Phase three evidence thus far gives the strongest possible indication that the Swiss Cheese theory came into play at Pike; all the holes eventually lined up and the tragic outcome was an explosion.

As with many accidents in aviation, industrial and other processes and activities had the "chain"of events been broken (by regulation, inspection, training or otherwise) the disaster might have been avoided.

That's what Callaghan specialises in; how long she took to solo an aircraft has absolutely nothing to do with it!

The accident had nothing to do with the 'type' of aircraft, in that era both DC-10's and 747's used INS as their primary navigation aid, tho' in this accident the Mark 1 eyeball was supposed to make the final decision i.e. they had to be visual before descending to the lower level. ( I'm not making a judgement, read it all for yourself. )

A Cessna 152 fitted with INS and with waypoints programmed as that DC-10 had been - and flown by the same crew responsible for decisions and actions taken - would have had the same result.

This is not a Boeing / Douglas / Airbus thing, but maybe Air NZ felt that the " image " of the DC-10 being a " dangerous " aircraft as a result of Erebus, was likely to influence ticket sales, just as Lockerbie gave PanAm an image of being a dangerous airline to fly with, and the public had a choice, albeit misguided, after Lockerbie PanAm would probably have been the safest ! ( but try telling that to the travelling public, " image " is everything, stuff the "facts". )

This is not a Boeing / Douglas / Airbus thing, but maybe Air NZ felt that the " image " of the DC-10 being a " dangerous " aircraft as a result of Erebus, was likely to influence ticket sales, just as Lockerbie gave PanAm an image of being a dangerous airline to fly with, and the public had a choice, albeit misguided, after Lockerbie PanAm would probably have been the safest ! ( but try telling that to the travelling public, " image " is everything, stuff the "facts". )

I totally agree. Similar story with the de Havilland Comet and metal fatigue which wasn't properly understood or factored-into designs until the first Comet disasters. Interesting that Nevil Shute (designer R100 and founder/designer Airspeed Ltd) predicted the consequences of fatigue in 'No Highway' -- which might have a different title in the USA? The fictional 'Reindeer' and the wonderful eccentric RAE Farnborough boffin, Mr Theodore Honey. Also true of the airships R101/R100. Shute tells the story in his autobiography, Slide Rule.

As a result, it has been suggested to me that the widow of the, then, aforementioned Chief Inspector of Accidents might well have a case for libel against P.H.

That's as maybe, but let's face it - some of the things he did were woefully naive. Re-editing a CVR transcript alone with a management representative from the airline present? Without notifying a single member of the group who had agreed on the CVR transcript only days before? Such things would not be accepted in this day and age, and rightly so. As a pilot and investigator he may have been a top-drawer example of the time, but there's no way that his methods would be accepted today.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ExSp33db1rd

This is not a Boeing / Douglas / Airbus thing, but maybe Air NZ felt that the " image " of the DC-10 being a " dangerous " aircraft as a result of Erebus, was likely to influence ticket sales...

I always had it as a simple matter of economics. As far as ANZ at the time was concerned, their primary competitor was Qantas and Qantas used 747s, which on paper at least made more sense than the DC-10.

I always had it as a simple matter of economics. As far as ANZ at the time was concerned, their primary competitor was Qantas and Qantas used 747s, which on paper at least made more sense than the DC-10

.

So why buy the DC-10 in the first place ? Maybe 'cos they were already a 'Douglas' airline, better the devil you know ?